Have a Good Trip: Adventures in Psychedelics, now streaming on Netflix, features a large cast of celebrities, mostly comedians, opining on the highs and lows of getting really high. This is not about pot. The major focus is LSD and mushrooms, with a minor in peyote and DMT.
Directed by Donick Cary, the film is half shot and half animated (by Sugarshack). There are 13 different vignettes with celebs telling their craziest stories on psychedelics. Nick Kroll recalls munching a bag of 'shrooms on the beach in Malibu and his friends dumping kelp on him. Sting had calf's blood poured on him while high on peyote in Mexico. Rosie Perez ended up naked on a dancefloor in New York. Carrie Fisher had a conversation with an acorn in Central Park. A$AP Rocky had sex and "saw a rainbow shoot out of my dick."
For Ben Stiller, who's one of the film's producers, it was a bit of a bummer. He called his father Jerry, who consoled him. But Stiller jokes, "He was Jerry Stiller, not Jerry Garcia."
Grateful Dead drummer Bill Kreutzman takes a stand against being dosed, which he was. David Cross - not a Deadhead - says Dead shows "were the greatest place to trip."
Many advise to not trip with strangers and not to look into a mirror while under the infuence.
Anthony Bourdain, who claims to have taken 500 trips, says he wanted to mimic Hunter S. Thompson and submits, "It made me a better person."
Sting advises that "you need an intention" because it's not "something your're going to do everyday."
The one medical advisor interviewed, Dr. Charles Grob, reminds viewers that set and setting are keys to avoiding the stereotypical bad trip.
One of the highlights of Have a Good Trip is a re-enacted afterschool special called "Bad Trip," narrated by Adam Scott. It's a recurring theme, with teens jumping out of windows and having car accidents.
Other celebs include Nick Offerman (he plays the nutty psychedelic professor), Donovan, Reggie Watts, Deepak Chopra, Sarah Silverman, Jim James, Adam Horowitz, Kathleen Hanna, Marc Maron, Rob Corddry, Steve Agee, Adam DeVine, Blake Anderson, Nick Kroll, Paul Scheer, Matt Besser, Rob Heubel, Will Forte, Bret Gelman, Thomas Lennon, Robert Ben Garant, David Koechner, Zach Leary and Shepard Fairey.
That's a lot of star power for a film about dosing heavily on chemicals and plants. Who knew how many celebs (and people in general) have taken these potent hallucinogens?
While playing up the highs and lows, it's mostly about good times on psychedelics. The death of Diane Linkletter, daughter of TV personality Art Linkletter, who allegedly leaped out of a window to her death on LSD in 1969, is not mentioned, though it's alluded to in the "Bad Trip" segments.
Now, psychedelics aren't for fun and adventure anymore. As Grob notes, they can be used therapeutically. He predicts there will be "retreat centers" where people can go to experiment with them. Some cities (Denver, Oakland) have started to decriminalize their use and possession.
Have a Good Trip also acknowledges that development, but the focus is more jovial, thanks to the calvacade of comedians and music by a very cool band Yo La Tengo.
